As part of the transition of the blogger site over to the footsteps site is that I’ve had the opportunity to re-read a large number of the blogs leading up to and during the cancer and partway through the chemotherapy. Its been a really interesting retrospective look on what I was thinking at the time and all the information I didn’t know at the time when I wrote the entries.

Serendipity has the abilty to import blog entries from other systems, but the instructions are a little bit out of date.  I’ve managed to bring over all the old entries from Blogger, with pictures linke back to the old site which is great, however it brought in three entries for each entry and the dates are all wrong.  So I’m now slowly working back bringing them all back into the right date, then I have to bring all the old Joomla entries in, but I think it will be worth it

Many of the entries over the last two years show a great depth back into what I went through adapting to the country and also dealing with cancer here.  Basically I don’t want to lose those entries, so a few nights slow work ahead of me, but hey I think its worth it. When its finished the last two years of my life will all be back on the footsteps site!

After a lot of tossing and turning and I mean literally (check out the time – I can’t sleep) I convinced myself that the site would be better off using Serendipity as its CMS system instead of Joomla. Why?  Well after setting up the Shimoda House weblog and using Serendipty I was really impressed with how easy it was to setup.  Then add in a few issues with Joomla not working for me!

To try and resolve the problems with Joomla I tried the RC2 of version 1.5, and while my site sorta came back online, all the plugins had to be redone etc, then to add insult to injury the one module I really used ‘Myblog’ was now a commercial component.  So do I spend money on having a site that will need more work etc to just do what I’ve discovered Serendipity can do out of the box?  Plus I can email Serendipity from my mobile with picture support, dead easy, it looks like it can link into Coppermine for images, and well its just simple to use!  So bye bye Joomla, hello Serendipty.

I still think Joomla is a great product and it has a great many supporters, but it was just way to complex for what I really wanted to do and I suspect the upgrade to 1.5 is going to cause them a great deal of problems as its easy.  Right now that I’ve upgraded the site, written the first message, I can goto sleep!

Just had another great weekend away at
Shimoda. This time however it was camping out in indoors at Di’s
new house in Sotoura. Or rather her new old house.

Okay this blog entry has just turned into let play with embedding great moosic into the site.   And what better than BT!

[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mc3ULKls5GM]

[googlevideo:http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-1545172545091714537]

I’m had my times where I’ve played with
Linux before and never quite go the urge to switch over. About 4
month ago I upgraded my main PC to Vista and its not been a lovely
relationship so I was well open to seeing what Linux could offer.

My main PC runs my home entertainment system so I wanted something
that could do the same. I stumbled across LinuxMCE and it looked
fanstasic. I cleared one of my drives so it could install with all
the space it needed and what a freaking nightmare I walked into.

Firstly the LinuxMCE need Kubuntu whcih is a version of Ubunto
which has been getting great raves. From whom I’m not entirely
sure.

Today of writing I’ve not even jot LinuxMCE running as Kubutuu
does not recogise my sound system, graphics adapter, or my blue
tooth keyboard.

Now you coudl say hmm, go standard. Well Windows recognises my ATI
X1600 display driver, my Dinovo Keyboard, and my ASUS motherboard
SPDIF output. What is even more appalling is that the hardware is
nothing new. After much searching I found how to update my display
driver to get use of my ATI card. My sound is non existant and just
read a little about Blue tooth and ubuntu and you will dispair.

This is seriously one sad distribution. I’m work with compueter
technolgy every day and this is just a nightmare to make work.

Isn’t it amazing how things change in
life so rapidly. The last week has brought really sad news and
today for me it all changed. For a lovely change to the positive.
My blood results were good today and for the first time since I had
chemo the tumor markers have gone down. One of them had been
steadly going up and causing alot of concern.

Todays results are thats its gone back down to about the same level
as about two months ago and is now totally within normal range. Its
such a big relief and mean life can resume. That may sound stupid
as life always go on, but when you have something like this hanging
over your head its hard to just carry on like nothing is wrong.

I’m just so happy to be back!!

Its been a while since I updated the blog.
Many things have been going on. The most recent is that I found out
a very dear friend of mine has passed away due to ill health after
his fight with cancer. Pip was the second manager I worked for and
I don’t think I’ll ever find someone as inspirational as him. He
came from that rare breed of managers who actually took an interest
in how to develope his staff.

There were a number of us who still keep in touch that he took an
interest in. The time I spent working with him was so instramental
in the way I work now. I’ve tried in my own way to pass some of
that on, and will continue to as part of his legacy. When I left
his employ 8 years ago I stayed in touch and have always visited
whenever I return some. Unfortunatley the last trip home I visited
no one due to my own cancer, but still stayed in close contact via
email.

Its a reminder cancer kills. Can anyone who reads this do something
special. Go an put yourself on the bone marrow transplant list. Its
a simple blood test. (thats painless), and okay the actual donation
component is not so cool, but you could save someones life and
really make a huge difference.

Part of my past is working to save peoples lives and I know on a
couple of occasions I’ve been part of a team that has physically
saved peoples lives. You to can do it! Just go and get a blood test
and donate. Its well worth it.

Two weeks ago was allergy awareness week in New Zealand. A key articule/news
item that was run was about Grant Freeman who died after eating a meal at a
restaurant. (
New Zealand Herald). Grant Freeman was my sister in-laws brother. The Thomas
Whittle in this article is my nephew.

Donna has been speaking out about
food allergies and encouranging people to get themselves tested so they can find
out exactly how l
reactive they may be. Grant never got tested so didn’t
know the serverity of the reaction. Donna was recently on Breakfast TV and I
think did an amazing job.

So if you thinik you may be allergice to a
food, please go and get tested, it could save your life.

I’ve just had the most wonderful 4 days off here in Tokyo. The plan was to head down to Shimoda and the beach. Everyone was wondering why the hell goto the beach when a Typhoon was coming in.

After alot of time thinking, and realising
that I’ve not been posting stuff to the blog for a long time,
I’ve put alot of my thoughts back into order.

Part of that maybe that the all the Chemo drugs are flusing out of
my body. its taking bloody ages to get rid of them. While most days
pass without thinking of it there are days when I just crash and I
know it my normal self but rather the after affect of having all
the shte in my body.

I starting writing this do I miss the UK, yes I do. There are so
many things about London that I really loved. I still live in a
huge city but I miss the diversity of London. Here its Japan or
not. Fair enough I live in Japan so what else should I expect. I’m
going to try and write more.

later.